


Cognitive Recalibration, Scooby Style

by Gang_Aft_Agley



Series: Superheroes, Scooby Style [4]
Category: Avengers: Age of Ultron - Fandom, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, captain america: the winter soldier - Fandom
Genre: Buffi's just trying to make a safe space, Buffy Summers: Therapist, Chocolate, Cognitive Recalibration, Fuzzy blankets, Gen, Hydra, Hydra is a great big bag of dicks, I know NOTHING about therapy so bear with me, If You Squint - Freeform, Jane Austen - Freeform, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Stucky - Freeform, The Avengers - Freeform, Trauma, brain-washing, bucky needs help so steve brings in a specialist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-28
Updated: 2015-10-10
Packaged: 2018-04-23 19:03:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4888408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gang_Aft_Agley/pseuds/Gang_Aft_Agley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"This, THIS is your trauma expert, Fury?  She looks like she's twelve years old!"</p>
<p>"Who happens to be the only person on earth with experience in nursing an almost-mute, 99% feral boyfriend with super-strength back to sanity after subjective eons of torture and brainwashing."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is in the same 'verse as "Agent Coulson's Other Consultant", but takes place much later, after "Age of Ultron". I am writing this before "Civil War" comes out, so who knows how THAT will play out?
> 
> Again, blame twangcat for this madness!

It took Steve less than 24 hours after he found Bucky and brought him back to Stark Tower to realize that he needed help.

So, so, SO much help.

His friends, as well-intentioned as they were, were not actually of much use in this somewhat unprecedented situation. Sure, Sam had experience with veterans and combat and PTSD and trauma, but nothing on this level, and the brain-washing aspect was totally out of his league.  Natasha’s experiences with the Red Room were at least somewhat transferable, but she also brought up some pretty horrible memories for Bucky whenever they were in the same room.  Tony and Bruce, Thor and Rhodey, Clint and Pepper, they all _wanted_ to help, but they weren’t sure what Bucky needed, and were more than a little unnerved by his unwavering stare and general murder-face.  

Wanda had gently tried to probe his mind (with permission, of course) to see if she could do anything, and had flinched away nearly in tears, because there was so much pain and blankness layered together that it was almost unbearable, even for that brief moment.  The Vision just freaked him out; actually, Steve found him somewhat weird, too, but Bucky was a lot more fragile than he was at the moment, and hadn’t fought beside him, either.

Steve himself would quite literally do anything to get his best friend back, but he had no idea where to begin. None of them did, not really. Bucky himself was nearly catatonic most of the time, eating and showering and sleeping mechanically and only when told to, while the rest of them tiptoed around him cautiously, never knowing whether or not something might set him off.  Clearly, this state of affairs couldn’t continue.

So Steve gritted his teeth, and called Fury. The man had his fingers in lord knew _how_ many pies, and although his organization was still in shambles, he nevertheless had many, many contacts all over the world.  If he could pull a fully manned Helicarrier out of thin air on short notice, surely he could scare up a reputable therapist or two, one with experience in brain-washing and HYDRA and no telling _what_ else had been done to Bucky.

Fury _hmmed_ non-committally at first, and Steve could hear the wheels turning that bald head as he considered the problem. 

“I may know someone who knows someone who could possibly help.  They deal with all kinds of weird stuff, even weirder than SHIELD used to, and have rehabbed at least one person who had deliberately set out to destroy the world.  I’m sure we can work something out.”

 * * * * * * * * * * * 

Initially, when Steve saw the two strangers trailing after Director Fury, he assumed that the older, tweedy, distinguished-looking gentleman was the therapist, and that the young (at least, young- _looking_ – she seemed to be about his own age, give or take a few years, but at this point, Steve couldn’t be sure of anyone’s age) woman at his side was an assistant or a secretary.

“Captain, this is Miss Summers and Mr. Giles. They’re here to help with Sergeant Barnes’ recuperation.  Buffy, Rupert: Captain Rogers.”

Steve stepped forward and shook Mr. Giles’ hand, noting with approval the firm grip and curious calluses – gun calluses, to be sure, but some other, unusual ones that he didn’t recognize. 

“Mr. Giles, thank you so much for coming. _Anything_ you can do to help Bucky….” 

Mr. Giles coughed ,and flushed in slight embarrassment, gesturing to his companion. 

“Actually, Captain, Buffy here is the one who will be working with your friend.  I’m just along to assist her, to answer any questions _you_ may have, and to observe during their sessions so I can serve as a second opinion.”

Steve blinked in surprise, and turned to examine Miss Summer more closely; he’d barely noticed her when she entered, so focused had he been on Mr. Giles.

She was … _tiny_. And blonde.  And almost incomprehensible, judging by the idle chit-chat she’d been exchanging with the director as they walked in; Steve had understood about one word in ten.

_This_ was the person that Nick Fury has sworn up, down, left, right and center could help Bucky regain at least some semblance of normality?

Steve’s specifications had been exacting, but there was no possible way this woman could get the job done.  Even if she _did_ possess the necessary qualifications (which he was inclined to doubt, given her age), from a purely physical standpoint, she was _completely_ unsuitable: she’d last five minutes _at most_ if Bucky lashed out, as he inevitably would. She’d get killed, and that would screw up Bucky’s recovery even more; just another death on his conscience. Aside from, of course, the tragedy of a life senselessly cut short, but if she went in there unprepared, it was mostly her own fault for ending up dead.

“Director, I’m sorry, I’m sure she’s good at her job, but she’s going to get squashed like a _bug_ in there with Bucky if he goes off.”

Director Fury smirked slightly. 

“I wouldn’t underestimate her, Rogers. She’s quite capable of taking care of herself, but if it makes you feel better, feel free to jump in the sparring ring with her for a few rounds to test her out.  If your chivalry objects to _that_ , send in Agent Romanov instead.

Stark had been silent, staring with his mouth open during this entire exchange, but now he jumped in; clearly his skepticism was as great as Steve’s in this case, if not more so. 

“This?  _This_ is your trauma expert, Fury? She’s looks like she’s all of twelve years old.  What are her credentials for this kind of work?”

“’Scuse me, but _she_ is still in the room, and can speak for herself.” The diminutive blonde grinned toothily, but it never reached her eyes.  “On paper, I know, my official resume looks less than impressive: never finished college, high school counselor, fast food worker, and substitute parent for my little sister.  Trust me, I understand your doubts, but I _can_ help your friend.”

“Oh, for the love of …”

“Language, Rogers!”  Steve glared, but Fury remained unmoved and faintly amused. “You asked me to find someone who could rehabilitate Sergeant Barnes.  I called in a few favors and found Miss Summers.”

“Who, besides fighting evil and the forces of darkness since _high school_ , is possibly the only person on earth with experience in nursing an almost-mute, 99% feral boyfriend with super-strength back to sanity after subjective eons of torture and brainwashing, not mention coping with the guilt, angst and self-loathing that follows. Director Fury showed me all of Sergeant Barnes’ files and some tapes of how he’s doing since you got him back; he’s not _quite_ as bad as Angel was when he returned from the hell-dimension, but the situations aren’t exactly the same, so we’ll have to see.  Lucky for all of us, on this go-round I won’t be wrestling with my own guilt on top of everything else, so that’ll make things easier.  I’ve got some initial plans for our first session today, and we’ll play it by ear from there.  At least _this_ time I won’t have to worry about him losing his soul, and/or trying to drink my blood … probably.   HYDRA didn’t give him fangs, did they? Have you observed him during a full moon – he doesn’t go all furry, right?  No tentacles, slime, or unusual possession tattoos?”

“…what.”  There was absolutely _no_ expression on Steve’s face in this moment; probably because his conflicted emotions were too busy fighting each other for any one in particular to dominate.

“Director, did you tell Captain Rogers _nothing_ in advance of our visit today?” Mr. Giles looked more than a little put out; Fury chuckled and looked smug.

“No, Rupert, I did not, precisely because I wanted to see _that_ look on his face.”   Buffy giggled girlishly, and Giles seemed to grind his teeth.

“Well, let’s get this show on the road, and you can give Captain America and Iron Man the ‘the world is older than you know’ speech in the observation room, Giles; I’m sure your inner nerd will enjoy that part. Also, I’m amazed that a guy who was alive during the Depression didn’t even blink when I referred to his _boyfriend_.”

Steve blinked in surprise; he’d been so overwhelmed by the flood of words coming from the woman that that word in particular had flown completely beneath his radar.  Stark snorted, and seemed about to make a lewd comment, when the Director and Mr. Giles froze him with twin withering glances from three equally disdainful eyes.

“I doubt it will be necessary to run Buffy through her combat paces _today_ , since we don’t have much time this afternoon, and from what I understand, he’s still at least semi-restrained, correct?”

Steve nodded unwillingly, and Miss Summers’ smile became considerably warmer and more genuine.

“Great!” she chirped cheerfully. “This is really just a ‘get-to-know-you’ session.  I don’t expect him to start talking to me for quite some time yet, but I want to see how he reacts to my general presence before I start planning anything more concrete. What does he like to be called? Bucky?  James?  Sergeant? I’m guessing Winter Soldier is out, but I can’t exactly go in yelling ‘Hey, you’.  That would be bad, and the opposite of helpful.”

Completely nonplussed, and bemused by her never-ending chatter, Steve found himself trailing along after the Director and his friends towards the observation room they had set up for these sessions. Stark was at his side, looking equally confused.  Mr. Giles glanced back over his shoulders, smiling comprehendingly.

“You’ll soon get used to, ah, Buffy’s tendency to verbosity, I assure you.  She means well, and frankly, in this case, I think the more she talks the better, considering how silent Sergeant Barnes tends to be.”

“Giles, you don’t have to apologize for me; I think they get the point.  So, Bucky?” Miss Summers paused, her hand on the doorknob of the observation room as the others filed into the adjoining room, through which they would watch the proceedings through one-way glass. Steve shrugged helplessly.

“I … guess?  I mean, he answers to all of those names, as much as he responds to _anything_ , but that’s the one that’s most likely to be associated with _him_ … or at least, who he used to be.”

Miss Summers nodded understandingly, a soft, sympathetic smile on her lips.

“And it’s both the name mostly likely to have positive memories tied to it AND the one that HYDRA was least likely to use. Bucky it is.”

Steve shook his head in genuine disbelief as she turned the handle and went in.  As the door shut behind her, he heard her introduce herself to his best friend.

“Hi, Bucky.  My name is Buffy Summers.  Your friend Steve asked me to stop by; he thought I might be able to help sort out some of the stuff that’s cluttering up your head right now.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I know NOTHING about trauma or PTSD, or the treatment thereof, but I feel like this is a very Buffy way for her to try and get Bucky comfortable enough with her presence before she starts actually working on him.

For her second session with Bucky (once Steve had managed to _somehow_ process all the unprecedented information Mr. Giles had given him, but he had accepted a flying aircraft carrier, so he supposed he could deal with vampires and demons and who knew _what_ else), Buffy showed up with bulging pink tote bag, the contents of which caused Stark to hoot in derision when she unpacked it before she went in.

“Seriously, your plan to cognitively recalibrate the brainwashed Soviet assassin who could kill us all with his _non-metal_ pinky involves Disney, chocolate and fuzzy blankets?”

Buffy put her hands on her hips and matched Tony glare for glare; it helped that she only had to tilt her head up slightly to do it, between her very tall shoes and Tony’s lack of height.

“First of all, no, NO Disney, because despite their reputations, the Disney movies are pretty freakin’ _dark_. Uh, Bambi’s mom ringing a bell? Ursula the Sea-Witch is actually terrifying – my little sister had to be taken out of the movie theater SCREAMING at age two. Secondly, my plan is comfort, warmth, absence of painful of negative stimuli and as many soothing or positive vibes as I can do.  He’s been on ice for the past seventy years, _literally_ , so YES, fuzzy blankets.  Possibly teddy bears and other stuffed animals.  Duh. Chocolate, yes, but also any food in general, once I’ve done some careful research there.  Since I don’t know what he likes or what might be potentially triggering for him – remember, tortured by HYDRA, and food or the lack thereof can be used for torture – we’re starting simple. “

“And where does _Jane Austen_ fit into your master plan?” Tony persisted, rattling the DVD case at her.

“It’s almost six hours long, so it’s a good starting point; my schedule is clear today, and it may take him awhile to warm up to my presence enough to _relax_. No violence, no explosions, no scary or disruptive music, and it’s a love story with a happy ending. Plus, being set in the 1800s, there’s nothing about the costumes or the settings that should trigger anything from his time as the Winter Soldier.”

“Oh.”  Tony meekly placed the 1995 _Pride and Prejudice_ miniseries back in Buffy’s imperious, outstretched hand. 

“We’ll start with popcorn and chocolate; if he responds well to that without putting me through a wall first, we’ll move up to pizza.”

“Is that something that’s likely to happen? The … wall thing, I mean?” Despite seeing Buffy square off against Natasha on the sparring mats (which was _definitely_ a memory he was hanging onto for … future reference), Steve still couldn’t get over the fact that she was about 5’2” in her bare feet and not much over a hundred pounds soaking wet, or that Bucky was nearly twice her size.

“Probably.  I mean, at some point, inadvertently or otherwise, I’m gonna hit a nerve and he’ll lash out violently.  Particularly once he starts breaking through the controls that HYDRA put on him to prevent that very thing.  As soon as he realizes that he _can_ hit me, that there’s no chair and no mental block stopping him, he’s going to try and push those limits. Also, resurfacing memories can be painful, and he may not always be in control when that happens. At least, that’s what happened with Angel, and that’s what it sounded like from Steve’s description of the Helicarrier fight – the more Steve prodded at his returning memories, the angrier and more out-of-control he got, right, Steve?”

He nodded, unwillingly.  The more Bucky recognized him, the more he had tried to hurt him.

“See?  But at least I know and now _you_ know that I can take whatever he dishes out, at least long enough to either get away or for you to come in, so I’d like to take the restraints off today. Did you set the interview room up like I asked?”

“Yes; we’ve got arranged a bit like a living room, with a 50” flat screen and an oversized couch, and made it as un-clinical as possible.”

“Well, then, let’s get this show on the road – I’ve got a need for some Colin Firth with sideburns!”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here, have some more Buffy Summers, Therapist!
> 
> Completely un-betaed, all mistakes mine.

Nick Fury was a sneaky, Machiavellian, absolute _bastard_ of a man, and a diabolically clever one on top of that. 

Buffy had known this fact (in the abstract at least) long before he and Phil Coulson had shown up on the doorstep of Cleveland Slayer HQ in Lola, loaded down with both paper and electronic files.  There was a big difference, however, between hearing the stories secondhand from Giles (in his most snide tones, with an audible sniff, no less) and suddenly realizing that you’ve been played like a fiddle into actively _wanting_ to do whatever the (former? She still wasn’t entirely sure how the new hierarchy of the organization post-Project Insight played out in actual practice) Director of SHIELD had in mind.

In retrospect, she should have been suspicious the moment the c-word had been broken out: they’d started out by making Tony Stark a _consultant_ , and look where he had ended up!

She had been (relatively) immune to the vanity, nosiness and not-so-secret desire to sit at the cool kids’ table that Fury has used to lure in Tony Stark, but she had been no match for the heart-breaking puppy dog eyes wielded by what was _left_ of Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes.

Drat.

Giles was still more than a little miffed with Phil _and_ Fury over the whole “haven’t-told-Barton-about-the-resurrection-even-though-the-poor-boy-is-literally- _pining_ -away” business, but he’d let them in and greeted them civilly enough.  The two resurrected spies had indeed come on legitimate SHIELD business: advice on dealing with newly-awakened superheroes and how to help them cope with having their worlds turned upside down. Giles had been more than happy to lend them copies of the newly re-written Slayers Handbook (a version that even Buffy would have been willing to read back in the day) and spitball ideas about how to customize it for varying powers and temperaments.  Slayers, at least, tended to come with an inborn calling to the life; even if they fought and railed against, they rarely gave it up. These Inhumans (both real and hypothetical), however … let’s just say that not everyone was cut out to be a superhero, and leave it at that.

The pair’s real purpose had not even been hinted at until they were about to leave.  Fury had produced several thick manila folders from his briefcase, topped it off with a flash drive that Phil handed him, and slid the stack towards her across the coffee table as he finished packing up.

“What’s this?”  Buffy said suspiciously, her spider-senses tingling; SHIELD may not have been the Initiative, but official files still gave her the heebie-jeebies.

“A case that needs more detailed analysis; the usual consultation fee applies, of course.  Take it, look it over, talk it over with Giles, tell me what you think. I’d welcome your recommendations.” And then he swept out in a dignified swirl of black leather, leaving Phil to do the goodbyes and parting handshakes.  Even Spike couldn’t quite manage that move without looking overly dramatic; on Fury, it seemed only appropriate.

Of course, with an opening like that, Buffy’s curiosity had been piqued and the dreaded c-word had slipped right past her awareness when it had been oh-so-casually dropped into the conversation.

Double drat.

Unfortunately, once she had actually _looked_ at the files (mostly in Russian, but handily pre-translated, although she got a Potential to check them over, just in case) and watched the footage on the flash drive, it was already too late. Because while she had long ago decided that Hydra was collectively a great big bag of dicks, this was just an entirely new level of … _ughhhh_.  Words failed her, quips failed her, even _sarcasm_ failed her.  By the time she and Giles had gone through the whole sickening mess, she was _more_ than ready to volunteer as tribute, because _someone_ needed to wrap this guy up in a fuzzy blanket, give him a teddy bear, and tell him that everything would eventually be ok.

She let Phil get away with his very blandest of bland-faces (and he had legion) when she called him up to video conference about how to undo 70-plus years of Hydra brainwashing, torture, and conditioning, and discuss exactly how hands-on her role in the process would be (hint: _very)_.  Because while he and Fury had _said_ that they only wanted advice and recommendations (and repeatedly assured her that they'd had no expectations of anything more), she wasn’t quite blonde enough to believe that.

Nope, they’d known _exactly_ what looking at those files and images would do to her, how they would tug at her heartstrings and compel her to step in.  The difference between _then_ , _now_ and all the phases in between in the life of Bucky Barnes were stark, gut-wrenching, and irresistible; there was no way that Fury hadn’t _known_ how she would react, sprinkling that catnip down in front of her. The Powers That Be knew that she’d _tried_ her hardest to leave the file alone, but it was impossible.  Utterly and completely impossible.  She’d never had a business card saying “We Help the Helpless!”, but it wasn’t an inaccurate life motto, and despite being a vicious, nigh-unstoppable assassin who had nearly taken down Captain America, Bucky Barnes needed help.

Help that she was possibly the only person in the world qualified to give, thanks to her night job, her … _unconventional_ love life, and her multiple resurrections. Check and mate, Summers.

Triple drat.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here it is: the final chapter.
> 
> Of this story, anyway.

Working with Bucky Barnes was even more agonizing than Buffy had expected - and she hadn’t signed up thinking that it would be an ant-free picnic; quite the opposite, actually. 

Some of the trouble, of course, was the inevitable difference between just reading Barnes' files, and then actually staring directly into the super-soldier's wounded puppy dog eyes – which, _yeesh_ , those things were lethal weapons on their own, no metal arm or super-strength required.  It was a pretty wide gap, and one that required considerable effort to cross, but it was far from her biggest problem.

No, that honor when to the fact that she had actually planned _too far ahead_ , and for the wrong situation.  All of her plans, preparations, and research had been geared toward helping Bucky deal with all the crazy emotions his returning memories were inflicting upon him, sorting through all of that, and then teaching him to cope with the whole big awful sticky glob of _bad_ as best he could.

Admirable, and necessary, and what she had experience with, but those were goals for Stage _Two_ of Operation: Scrambled Egg (Stark’s name, not hers). 

Stage One was getting him to  admit to even  _having_ feelings and emotions in the first place.

Even now, months after the Triskelion Incident, he was still waaaaay more Winter Soldier than Bucky Barnes; not surprising, considering that he’d spent over seventy years as the former (if one counted time in cryo-sleep, which she did), and less than half of that as the latter.   Therefore, his psyche and mindset was that of an asset, not a human being, and an asset was just a tool in someone else’s hand, at least as far as HYDRA was concerned.

Tools didn’t feel anything, especially not about the jobs they were assigned; they just got down to the task at hand. Emotions were weaknesses, flaws to be ignored if possible, violently suppressed if not, and never, ever spoken of. 

Not helping the situation was the sickening fact that every time, _every single time_ , he started to break through this conditioning and show a teensy sliver of humanity, they’d stick him back in the Chair. The Chair was the one constant in his memories, no matter how many times they wiped him, and being anything other than silent, stoic and obedient meant more time in the hot seat … literally.  He'd do almost anything to avoid going back under.

To sum up: feelings = bad.  Talking about them = worse.  Even though he was no longer under HYDRA control, he was unable to shake that mental discipline.

Most of the time, according to Steve and the rest of the Avengers, he wouldn’t even cop to _physical_ sensations: hunger, heat, cold, exhaustion, that sort of thing. Verbalizing whatever is racing around inside his head would be outright impossible.

Of course, he _is_ feeling things, obviously,: anxiety and heightened fear responses around Natasha (stupid Red Room), for example, or guilt about Tony and Sam, confusion at the Vision, and pretty much everything in succession around Steve.

Mostly, Buffy herself inspires bewilderment, being so completely out of his range of experience, which is all to the good – he has no prepared or ingrained response to her, and hopefully she can sidle around his defenses, come at him sideways.  Even with this advantage, though, it still takes a long time for her to get _any_ reaction at all out of him.

He doesn’t speak during their first meeting, but there’s no need for him to, after all: she’s just introducing herself, telling him what little she knows about him, and why Steve asked her to come by. Anything else would be of less than no help, because she needs to give him a little time to get accustomed to the whole idea before pushing any further.

During their second session (the one where they watched _Pride and Prejudice_ ) he simply sat on the couch, again in total silence, through the first couple of episodes, staring straight ahead at the screen, occasionally glancing at her out of the corner of his eye like he was assessing a threat or a target, but didn’t want her to know. 

Eventually, he _did_ partake of the goodies she had brought, nibbling furtively, glancing at her out of the corner of his eyes, as though he expected her to snatch the food out of his hands; she had anticipated that, too, and had carefully arranged things accordingly.  They each had separate bowls of popcorn and bags of chocolate at their respective ends of the coffee table, so she would _never_ be reaching in the direction of _his_ food. When she pauses halfway through for a bathroom break and to order pizza, they each get their own pie, and she deliberately eats only a few slices of hers before nudging the rest in his direction.  Super soldier metabolisms and all that. 

He also makes good use of the fuzzy blankets she provided, carefully constructing a little nest of extra pillows before burrito-ing himself up in the blankets until only his eyes are visible – it’s kind of adorable, actually.  When he does, Buffy smiles approvingly, and curls up under her own blanket, deliberately relaxing her body language to convey ease and comfort in his presence.

As far as she’s concerned, right now he’s a giant cat, to be ignored until he chooses to come to her.  She leaves food out for him and makes sure the environment is comfortable, but otherwise makes no demands of him.

* * *

That sets the pattern for the early days, because she wants him to get used to her presence and stop seeing her as quite so much as a threat before she starts poking at his brain – metaphorically speaking, anyway, because according to Phil that was a real thing that SHIELD had actually done to him in the aftermath of TAHITI, with robotic needles and everything, and it sounded _horrifying_. So, nope, poking with words _only_.  

That doesn’t make it any easier on Barnes when she _does_ start poking, nibbling away at the edges of what happened to him, feeling out what he remembers and what he doesn’t.  She tries to stick to a tit for tat system, telling him a little about herself for everything he tells her, hoping to keep at least a _little_ parity through what is sure to be a long, agonizing process.

He still never ascribes emotions to himself, in the things he tells her, mostly sticking to “Yes” or “No” answers to the questions that she asks.  When he does elaborate, it’s always in cold, clinical terms: “I did this” and “I did that”. If she asks for what he felt or thought, he cocks his head to the side and looks at her blankly, almost as if her question did not compute. 

It’s different than nursing Angel back to health and sanity, and harder.  Whatever they did to her vampire ex-boyfriend in that hell-dimension had been horrible and ugly and cruelly deliberate, but its only purpose had been to break his sanity into teeny tiny pieces; all she’d had to do was distance Angel from the trauma enough that he could put himself back together.  Hydra didn’t _break_ Barnes; they methodically disassembled him, and then re-assembled him into something new, creating the Winter Soldier out of his component parts.

As a result, she isn’t trying to _fix_ him, per se, and anyway, she’s not sure she _could_ fix him – she’ll leave that to people with more degrees and experience than she’s got.  Nope, her job is to crack through enough of the Winter Soldier conditioning to make it possible for him to _be_ fixed. But gently, carefully, with almost surgical precision, because if she breaks him _again_ , it might prove impossible to ever put him back together.

To that end, she tries to make it as unclinical and comfortable as possible, and she could _almost_ kiss Tony Stark for his contribution to the cause, because the couch he got for the interview room is like snuggling into a fluffy cloud; it’s as unlike the Chair as a piece of furniture could possibly be. She likes to sit cross-legged in one corner, with a pillow on her lap, while they talk, her shoes kicked off to the side. She’s also careful to take breaks in the tough stuff, to keep him from getting overwhelmed; he responded well enough to Jane Austen that she sticks to that pattern and shows a lot of movies.   Mostly period dramas with no violence, and nature or history documentaries.

Sometimes, on the good days, after he stops flinching away from her mere presence, he puts his head on her lap pillow, stretching out comfortably, and lets her stroke his hair as they talk; she gets the sense that he is desperately touch-starved, but wasn’t sure how to ask for it.  The cat metaphor was apparently more appropriate than she had originally thought.

On the bad days, when he’s been unable to sleep, or had nightmares, or had more than the usual numbers of memories resurface, he paces agitatedly, unable to relax, a wounded animal at bay. If she speaks, he glares and almost snarls, baring his teeth.  It’s hard to control her body language on those occasions, because she has to stay tense and alert without _looking_ like she’s tense and alert. 

On the _really_ bad days, he doesn’t even bother pacing, but just settles into a defensive crouch in a corner.  Sometimes he seems angry, other times just sad and lost, but in neither case is he up to any sort human interaction.  When that happens, she just leaves him blankets and snacks just out of reach (far enough away that she doesn’t invade his personal space _too_ badly, but close enough that he can snatch, grab and quickly retreat back into his corner) and starts a movie anyway.  She’s _there_ , but that’s all she has to be if he doesn’t want to engage.

Steve nearly calls the whole thing off the first time Bucky tries to backhand her across the room, even though he’s seen what she can do, knows that she can handle this.  She’s shaken, of course, but her Slayer reflexes were more than adequate to let her see the blow coming and block it; it was more of a surprise than anything else. His strength was expected, having sparred with Steve and seen footage of the Winter Soldier’s fights, but not quite the speed: he moves like a king cobra, and he’d erupted out of nowhere.

Luckily, he doesn’t do that often, and she knows he’s only lashing out when she strikes something particularly painful, something that forces a reaction out of him that he is unable to verbalize. She knows this, in her head, but it’s cold consolation later, when she’s icing her bruises, or taking out her frustration with his continued silence on the heavy bag, pretending that it’s Fury for dragging her into this mess in the first place.

As the bad days become fewer and fewer, and less and less intense, she starts diving deeper and deeper into the darker and still raw and aching parts of both of their pasts.  She asks him harder questions, and as a sick, twisted reward, she tells him more about her own demons.  Somewhere, hopefully, in the damaged parts of her own psyche, there will be a _something_ he can relate to, some lifeline he can grab ahold of and let her pull him back out into the light.

She tells him about the first time she died, about knowing she was the subject of a prophecy; of realizing that nothing she could do or say would alter her coming demise, and so she walked to it willingly, a lamb to the slaughter.

She talks about her brief episode of telepathy, the overwhelming power of _everyone’s_ fear and pain and loneliness, the deafening cacophony and immense weight of that knowledge.

She talks about fighting Angelus, to stop Acathla from swallowing the world.  She talks about the weeks and months of being stalked by Angelus, of being haunted by the soulless demon with her boyfriend’s face.  She tells him about finally accepting that Angel, for all intents and purposes, was dead, and that the only way she could save everyone and everything she cared about was to kill Angelus. 

She tells him about the moment that Angel’s soul had been restored, and the almost immediate realization that this changed nothing: Acathla had been reawakened.  She tells him of sending the one she loved to his death with her kiss on his lips and her sword in his heart.

She tells him about heaven, about being enveloped in warmth and love, and then being forcibly expelled from that soft, timeless cocoon, to dig herself out of her own grave.  How after that, the living world was painfully bright and deafeningly loud, everything hard and sharp and uncertain.  In heaven, she was whole and complete, content and happy, and then suddenly she … wasn’t, not anymore.  She still has trouble, finding the words to describe the shock and the loss and  …

“That’s … that’s what it felt like. Almost.”

His voice is scratchy and shaking, but still, it’s the first time he’s volunteered information, and  the first time he’s used the word _felt_.

 

“Before I saw him, I was … was always cold, but it never seemed to matter.  I had orders, and I followed them, and nothing else existed.  Everything was so … _clear_. And then I saw the man on the bridge, and he knew my name, and he had the shield, and, and …. it just cracked me wide open.” 

“You had a purpose and a place in the world, and suddenly you didn’t.”  He’s tense and trembling under her hands, but she doesn’t dare show him that she’s as shaken to hear his sudden revelation as he obviously is to make it.

Bucky nods, slowly.

“I don’t … I don’t think anyone else … quite understands.  Steve doesn’t. He can’t.  He was in the plane … and then he woke up here … in this time, but there was never … never that in-between time … of absolute … of absolute _certainty_. There was no … no certainty. Not in the war, and not now. In the cold … there was clarity. There was purpose. He … doesn’t … he can’t see how hard it is to suddenly have that ripped away.  No one does.  No one but you, apparently.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that. There aren’t many of us, true … it’s kind of an exclusive club, but I think Clint … y’know, Barton, the guy with the arrows, at least knows what it’s like.  He got mind-whammied by a god, right before the Chitauri invasion, and that really screwed him up for a long time; still not completely over it, I imagine. Not exactly the same thing, but pretty close in a lot of ways.  I’m sure he’d be willing to talk about it, if I’m not around and you need to share.”

He huffs, uncertainly, and she keeps stroking his hair as he burrows his face even deeper into the pillow in her lap. 

“There’s a big difference, though, between what happened to you and Clint, and what happened to me.  Something that’ll make adjusting to life outside the cold much, much easier.”

“Hmmm?”  He doesn’t look up, be she can feel the intensity of the attention he’s directing at her all the same. 

“My friends pulled me out of _heaven_.  Steve … although you didn’t know it at the time, and I _know_ it doesn’t feel like it now … he pulled you out of hell. Right now, you’re in limbo, working your way back out.  All we gotta do is help you take the last few steps … if you’ll let us.  Okay, Bucky?”

There’s a long pause, and for several heartbeats, she’s afraid that she’s lost him again.  Then:

“…okay.”

 


End file.
